Friuli - Friday Photos Finale

Trieste Canal

Friuli Friday Photos Finale is my final Friday blog of 2012. These shots are from an extraordinary spring adventure in Friuli-Venezia-Giulia and one from the Veneto just next door. We are in Northeast Italy here, in a land still seeking an identity after changing hands frequently in the 19th and early 20th centuries. I never would have thought I would have eaten the best sauerkraut of my life in Italy, and I did. Tall people, Fascist art, pork  in a dozen ways on one plate, my kind of weirdness shared with friends. Nicolas Emery, the famous Rubicon explorer, his fiancée Giulia Laveto (aka juujee), and of course The Schmee were all present and on board for wine, food, and Friuli.

The gang posed around the statue of the immensely accessible James Joyce (sarcasm intended)

These kinds of statues are all over Friuli. I imagine Mussolini placed these carefully about the country so he could have masturbation fodder in every town he visited.

"My pants are falling down and I am missing my diaper. Let go of my head damn bird!"

We discovered Giulia loves bright green and so this classic Fiat 500 was just the ticket. We could have carried this car in our packs.

I love street scenes. I see beauty in the edges of things. I find myself happiest in a place when I know I see something most people simply pass by and rarely notice.

This shot is only about 1 thing. Do you see it? If you comment on this post I want to hear your guess

I love these terraced vineyards. We were not far from the Slovenian border here. After all this time traveling I am never bored seeing a vineyard.

This winemaker in the Veneto outside of Verona was showing us where he buried a bull horn full of manure in the natural wine tradition. I am not kidding, all the growers do it around the world. He made killer pizza, good wines, and was pretty damn funny. This was my first time in the Veneto countryside and the first time I heard the Veneto Italian accent. It sounded like someone from Cuba speaking Italian. Quick, with a rising cadence, and quite lovely to hear.

Every year I return to Italy I find many reasons to return to Italy.

Auguri di buone feste e di un buon anno in arrivo

Final Haiku Sunday (Christmas in LA) of the Year is Next!

Verona, Italy - A Quick Look

Juliet and I were married April 30,2009. At the time I was the owner of a travel company based in Southern Italy. My work really did not allow for us to marry as soon as we would have liked and in fact we had to return to Italy just after our wedding for work related trips and to meet friends whom we had planned to show Italy prior to finalizing our wedding date. In essence, May 2009 was technically our honeymoon but was much more like a working vacation with friends and family.

Two of our dearest friends joined us on our trip up to Verona and ultimately Alto Adige. On this little sojourn in Verona we had the pleasure to meet our now wonderful friend, Nicolas Emery. Nick lives in Verona year round and works as a trip designer and guide for the wildly successful Travel for Teens. If you have teenage children and would like them to experience travel in Italy or Europe at large, Travel for Teens is the top company operating trips of this nature today. Ned Clark is the VP of TFT and here is a link to how to find him. I have experienced first hand the level of service and safety these folks offer and it is exceptional. I wish they had been around when I was 16 :-)

Nick and I hit it off immediately as he is a talented photographer (here is his photo blog) and speaks flawless Italian. These are the kinds of allies I seek when I am abroad.

We return to Verona this year to run around the Veneto wine country with Nick and to finally meet his very lovely ragazza (girlfriend) Giulia. Both Juliet and Giulia have birthdays around this time so we will most definitely celebrate with this:

or this...

This is going to be a wonderful discovery time for Juliet and me. I hope you enjoy this little taste of Verona and there will be much more to come upon our return.

Italy Itinerary - May 2012

The Blissful Adventurer returns to Italy on May 7, 2012 for a 24 day run of blissful, wine-soaked, photo-laden, pursuits of new experiences to share with all of you.

Our trip this year is partly vacation and also important research for upcoming writing and photo projects. 

While on our journey I will be enlisting the services of some very fine guest bloggers on TBA as well as posting updates from abroad. Before we leave our new website will be fully functional (I hope) and I am even more hopeful that our first book will be released. Blissful Adventures - The First 5 Years in Pictures

For today I am listing our itinerary which is as much a labor of love as it is a bit grueling. I would not recommend such an undertaking to an unseasoned Italian traveler.

May 7 - Depart Denver for Venice (this will be Juliet's first trip to Venice)

May 8 - arrive Venice and explore all day with a Venice expert. Dinner likely at Al Covo (a place I have longed to try)

May 9 - Venice relaxing and exploration with a long Ventian lunch before boarding a train for Le Marche and the town of Ascoli Piceno

May 10 - Intense day of exploration in Le Marche with a foremost expert on the region, Mariano Pallottini. We will be exploring vineyards, the sea, olives, and especially the food of the region.

May 11- A busy photography morning in Le Marche and a long regional lunch followed by a little more time near the sea before heading to one of our many places we call home: Puglia

May 12-15 We will be in our beloved Puglia with our newest cameras seeking new dining experiences along the way. We have some American friends who will be there at the time and of course our very dear friends Antonello and Laura who own and operate my former company Southern Visions Travel.

May 15-17 ROME! Home to Rome to see our dear friends Katie Parla and Peter Blute. We are hoping to explore the vineyards at The University of Dallas campus at Due Santi for a little photo work and article I would like to write on the lovely wines being produced there. We will finally make it to Hostaria Glass after all these times missing it.

May 17 - We travel north to Verona to spend time with our dear friend Nicolas Emery and to finally meet his lovely ragazza Giulia Laveto. On our way will stop near Parma to dine at the world-class Antica Corte Pallavicina

May 18-19 - Running around the Veneto with our venerable foursome. We are hoping to meet some of the more exotic winemakers doing things naturally and perhaps a little off the beaten track (or a lot)

May 19-22 Friuli Venezia Giulia - Finally after so many years I will make it to Friuli to explore the region's amazing wines (I believe Friuli is at  forefront of white wine making in Europe) and to research a bit about the coffee trade in the region. The four of us will celebrate Juliet's birthday with an amazing lunch in Trieste on the 22nd

May 22nd-31st Sicily here we come! At long last I return to Sicily, a place I swore my allegiance in 2006. This time we will be running around with our favorite Sicilian winemaker - Marilena Barbera who will show us how to live life like a local. At the end of the trip we will hike and explore the amazing vineyards on Mt Etna for a photo and wine experience like none I have ever experienced. Our Etna journey will be hosted by the amazing Thomas Schuster of Quincunx. In Sicily we plan to explore Trapani, Erice, Marsala, Segesta, Palermo, Menfi, Ragusa, Taormina, and vineyards strewn about the largest island in the Mediterranean,

May 31 - We fly from Catania to Milan to DC to Denver (ugh!)

Any suggestions about food, people, or places we should see along this amazing journey please let us know. This is a very brief synopsis and there will be more details down the road.

Cheers!